Announcers have grown on me.
Especially Mr. Tom Durkin. Announcers have a unique job in communicating the actions on the race track clearly to spectators. Tom takes that communication to another level in providing great entertainment to a potentially tedious and repetitive task. There are other announcers who do a great job at building excitement through the race of course, but this thanks is to Tom.
My favorite horse to watch and listen to Tom call is Arrrrr. Arrrrr is a favorite horse of mine, as well as my coworkers Marta and Sarah and I was introduced to Arrrrr a little less than a year ago. I love to listen to Tom call the race and use dialects of pirates, growling and various other noises.
Arrrrr raced most recently June 26th, 2008 at Belmont Park, and Tom really got into his calling of this race. Arrrrr lead most of the trip around the track and Tom provided the beautiful call that had me rolling in the office. Arrrrr finished second, but I had to watch the replay of the race like three times, with Marta, to just sink in how well Tom called this race.
I have searched YouTube and all the known sources for race replays, but since this was not a graded stakes, I have had no luck finding a video for you to watch, but if you do have a subscription to watch race-replays, I must insist on looking up this race and watching it, like three times.
Durkin was also great to watch on Preakness day, at least I think that was the race he was on, displaying a chart he had drawn up and explained some data about racing...I don't remember the data but I remember how entertaining he was presenting it.
Speaking of Durkin, Amidala passed along this wonderful sound-bite from the 4th race at Belmont on the 4th of July, 2008:
http://www.equidaily.com/bestbet/extras/misc/2008/dorayme.mp3
Other
Durkin Vids of Interest:
Perfect Soul Update
Finally, two starters are emerging from Perfect Soul's first crop of 2-year-olds.
Chile Chico
7/11/08
Assiniboia Downs dirt
5 Furlongs
MSW Race #2 $12,000
Post Position #6
Jockey: Anderson M
Fionnaur
7/13/08
Delaware Park dirt
5 Furlongs
MSW Race #1 $40,000
Post Position #4
Jockey: Prado E S
You can find a complete following of his first crop on this permanent page I have set up. Much like our Maiden Watch blog, I will try to cover what I can for his runners and workers, but it is tedious =)
Here are past blog posts you can read to learn more about why I am following Perfect Soul:
http://cs.bloodhorse.com/blogs/adamsturf/archive/2008/03/28/the-perfect-following.aspx
http://cs.bloodhorse.com/blogs/adamsturf/archive/2008/04/24/this-soul-is-going-to-the-derby.aspx
